Research Report

Research Report Beginning with Criticism: An Analysis of the First Four Volumes of Art South Africa Candidate Name: Clarissa Snapper Student Number: 0514950k Degree: Master’s by Coursework and Research Report in History of Art Faculty: Humanities, Social Science and Education Supervisor: Professor Anitra Nettleton Abstract: Art South Africa is currently the leading, professionally published art magazine in South Africa. The magazine plays an important role in the dissemination of art discourse and art news and is the only ongoing, printed forum devoted exclusively to South African contemporary art. In this paper I will be looking at Art South Africa to describe the type of art texts it presents and the particular position it has taken in the contemporary art world of South Africa. In doing this I will be analysing the magazine to register the types of writing and other information in formats such as art news, exhibition reviews, artist bios, interviews and even advertising. This paper will also be analysing selected texts to determine the key issues that are represented and the way those issues have been represented with a critical position. Looking at Art South Africa from many angles will show that criticality is one of the magazine’s ideological aims and though the magazine’s format changes over time, it has continually sought to engage its readers in critical discourse. Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction 1 1.1 Aim 1 1.2 Rationale 1 1.2.1 History and Texts 2 1.2.2 Why Art Criticism? 3 1.3 Scope 5 1.4 Key Terms Chapter 2: Literature and Theory 10 2.1 The Necessity of Researching Art Writing 10 2.1.1 Why is Art South Africa important? 13 2.2 Understanding Art Critical Writing and Critical Theory 18 2.2.1 A Brief History of Criticism in the Western World 18 2.2.2 The Theoretical Framework 23 Chapter 3: Art South Africa, Phase 1 32 3.1 Analysing Art South Africa 32 3.2 Looking at Phase 1, Issues 1 and 2 34 3.2.1 Analysis of volume 1, issue 1 34 The news section 36 The features section 38 The reviews section 40 3.2.2 Analysis of volume 1, issue 2 41 The editorial 41 The features section 42 3.3 Criticality in Art South Africa, Phase 1 46 3.3.1 Example 1 Example 1 A 48 Example 1 B 49 3.3.2 Example 2 51 3.3.3 Example 3 Example 3A 53 Example 3B 55 Chapter 4: Art South Africa, Phase 2 58 4.1 Analysis of Phase 2 58 4.1.2 Analysis of Volume 3, Issue 4 59 The editorial 60 Letters to the editor 61 The news section 62 The features section 64 The reviews section 67 4.2 Theme Topics in Volume 4 68 4.2.1 Volume 4, Issue 1 68 4.2.2 Volume 4, Issue 2 71 4.3 Analysis and Discussion 73 Chapter 5: Conclusion 81 Acknowledgments 88 Appendix 89 Further Reading List 91 Bibliography 93 Chapter 1: Introduction Aim First published in the spring of 2002, Art South Africa is a professionally published art magazine and it is the only ongoing, printed forum for art writing on South African contemporary art. This important and unique magazine is the subject of this research report. In this paper I will examine the first four volumes of Art South Africa and I will analyse the texts from those issues to determine the type of information it presents and the particular position it has taken in the contemporary art world of South Africa. Specifically, I will analyse critical texts presented in the journal to try to establish how the magazine has been positioned as a critical body of texts. In doing this I will be analysing the magazine to register the types of writing and how the authors handle critical issues in formats such as art news, exhibition reviews, artists’ biographies and interviews. These analyses will give indications as to how the editors and other contributors to Art South Africa perceive its role as a source of criticism, which critical issues are seen as worthy of printing and the techniques it uses to effectively present critiques. Rationale Having now established the basic aim of this project, I will explain why Art South Africa has been chosen as an important subject in the history of South African art. The first question I will address is why is art criticism important, and secondly, why is Art South Africa important? History and texts: To address the significance of art criticism I must first explain the importance of correlating the history of a society with the literature it produces. The act of writing sets 1 into motion a literary act as well as a social act1 the literary act is a witness to the conditions of the time in which it was written. In the same way the text also shapes the readers. The evidence of this interaction between society and text, are the traces of “ideology”2 or perhaps simply the/a “worldview” that the author always leaves imprinted on the text. So, in the practice of analysing literature (including art writing and criticism) the critic may, as in traditional criticism, view the text as a static composition, with fixed eternal meaning, as the traditional literary critics did3, or they may see the text as a localised, period-specific object, which, with careful study, can be understood as a historical artefact of a specific moment and place in which it was written. Art criticism too contains traces of the author’s social position. Whether the traces that are shown through the authors choice of words, value judgements or any other kind of textual indicator are called ideology or simply opinions about art, art writing can reveal the social values of the author and, on a larger scale, popular values for the times. In addition, the material conditions in which the texts are written also affect the nature of the text and give information about the social context for the publication. Financial factors have always shaped the goals of the texts, its limitations and the span of its readership. Everything from the price of the text to the number of copies distributed can give the historian or literary critic information on the nature of the text and the social context. For example, Art South Africa is severely limited in its ability to reach the entire 1 Edmund Cros, The Theory and Practice of Sociocriticism (Minneapolis, MN: U of Minnesota, 1988) 5. Here Cros discussed the necessity of social act of reading a text. Only through the reading of the text does the text become part of society. The work of E. Cros will be discussed in detail in chapter 2. 2 Ibid. Cros used the term “ideological traces” to describe this characteristic. This too will be discussed more thoroughly in chapter 2. 3 There is no clear date for the end of traditional criticism or the beginning of criticism, which accounts for social “eras” which affect the meaning of the texts, but many of the most important theories of this type of criticism began in the latter half of the twentieth century. Theories such as New Historicism, postcolonial studies and feminist criticism all began roughly at the same time during the 1960s, 1970s and beyond. But, certainly these theories arose from Marxist roots. 2 population because the majority of the population, including people who are interested in the arts, is severely impoverished and will never purchase an art magazine.4 In both the analysis of the material conditions and the written content of the text there is a physical manifestation (perhaps in the quality of its printing) as well as a sociological imprint (perhaps in the language of the discourses it engages) of a particular historical moment. The goal of this research report is not to describe long-gone history but to describe a historical moment. That moment is the beginning of the art magazine Art South Africa. I will be concerned with analysing the content and the characteristics of this magazine to describe accurately what it represents; it is an attempt to understand the current situation so as to preserve an interpretation of what Art South Africa was doing and how it influenced the way art is positioned in South Africa. Why Art Criticism? Remembering the discussion above, the purpose of discussing art writing and criticism is simply because it is a text, and like any other text it reveals significant discussions, material conditions, and social values which are characteristics of its historical context. Art criticism is also significant because it often deals expressly with these issues, unlike some other texts such as tax forms, instruction manuals for electronic devices, or maps, which all also contain sociological information, but do not discuss things such as race and power relations explicitly. 4 Art is an elite crowd anywhere, so perhaps poverty doesn’t affect the magazine’s readership because the majority of people wouldn’t be reading the magazine anyway. But I like to think that if at least schools, public libraries and other institutions had more funding, they would carry the magazine and there would be a greater number of readers. Furthermore, poverty affects people who are interested in art as well as those who are not. Though the art crowd is usually middle or upper-class, I am sure that a large percentage of art students find Art South Africa too costly for purchase. 3 More particularly, I chose Art South Africa, because it is distributed nationwide and even in several other countries.

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